This Troilus, in gift of curtesie,

With hauk on hond, and with a huge rout
Of knightes, rode, and did her company,

Passing all through the valley far about;
And further would have ridden out of doubt.
Full faine and woe was him to gone so sone,
But turn he must, and it was eke to doen.

CHAUCER.

10. Ottava rima.-A metre with an Italian name, and borrowed from Italy, where it is used generally for narrative poetry. Eight lines of heroics, the first six rhyming alternately, the last two in succession.

Arrived there, a prodigious noise he hears,
Which suddenly along the forest spread;
Whereat from out his quiver he prepares

An arrow for his bow, and lifts his head;
And, lo a monstrous herd of swine appears,
And onward rushes with tempestuous tread,
And to the fountain's brink precisely pours,
So that the giant's joined by all the boars.

Morgante Maggiore (LD. BYRON's Translation)..

11. Terza rima.-Borrowed both in name and nature

from the Italian.

The Spirit of the fervent days of old,

When Words were things that came to pass, and Thought

Flash'd o'er the future, bidding men behold

Their children's children's doom already brought

Forth from the abyss of Time which is to be,

The chaos of events where lie half-wrought

Shapes that must undergo mortality:

What the great seers of Israel wore within,
That Spirit was on them and is on me;
And if, Cassandra-like, amidst the din
Of conflicts none will hear, or hearing heed
This voice from out the wilderness, the sin
Be theirs, and my own feelings be my meed,

The only guerdon I have ever known.

12. Alexandrines.-Six measures, x a, generally (perhaps always) with rhyme.

13. Spenserian stanza.-Eight lines of the formula x a × 5, followed by an Alexandrine.

It hath been through all ages ever seen,
That with the prize of arms and chivalrie
The prize of beauty still hath joined been,
And that for reason's special privitie;
For either doth on other much rely.
For he meseems most fit the fair to serve

That can her best defend from villanie;
And she most fit his service doth deserve,

That fairest is, and from her faith will never swerve.

SPENSER.

14. Service Metre.-Couplets of seven measures. This is the Common Metre of the Psalm versions. It is also called Common Measure, or Long Measure. In this metre there is always a pause after the fourth measure, and many grammarians consider that with that pause the line ends. According to this view, the Service Metre does not consist of two long lines with seven measures each; but of four short ones, with four and three measures each alternately. The Psalm versions are printed so as to exhibit this pause or break.

The Lord descended from above, and bow'd the heavens most high,
And underneath his feet He cast | the darkness of the sky.
On Cherubs and on Seraphim | full royally He rode,
And on the wings of mighty winds | came flying all abroad.

STERNHOLD AND HOPKINS.

In this matter the following rule is convenient. When the last syllable of the fourth measure in the one verse rhymes with the corresponding syllable in the other, the long verse should be looked upon as broken up into two short ones; in other words, the couplets should be dealt with as a stanza. Where there is no rhyme except at the seventh measure, the verse should remain undivided. Thus:

Turn, gentle hermit of the glen, and guide thy lonely way
To where yon taper cheers the vale | with hospitable ray-

constitutes a single couplet of two lines, the number of thymes being two. But,

Turn, gentle hermit of the dale,
And guide thy lonely way

To where yon taper cheers the vale

With hospitable ray.-GOLDSMITH.

constitutes a stanza of four lines, the number of rhymes being four.

15. Ballad Stanza.-Service metre broken up in the way just indicated.-Goldsmith's Edwin and Angelina, &c., from which the last stanza was an extract.

16. Poulterer's Measure.-Alexandrines and Service Metre alternately.

§ 235. Licences.-It rarely happens that, even in the most regular metres, the same measure is exclusively adhered to throughout. Instead of

There comes the squáll more black than níght,
Before the Adrian gale-

the author writes

There comes the squáll blacker than night,
Before the Adrian gale.-MACAULAY.

substituting a x for æ a, and giving variety to his verse. Again, in the following line from Marlow, we find a x in the place of x a.

Týrants swim sáfest ín a púrple floód.

§ 236. Symmetrical Metres.-Allowing for the indifference of the last measure, the syllables in all the lines hitherto quoted have been a multiple of the accents, and the verses have been symmetrical.

§ 237. Unsymmetrical Metre.-Lines, where the syllables are not a multiple of the accents, may be called unsymmetrical.

In the year since Jésus diéd for mén,
Eighteen hundred years and tén,

We were a gallant cómpaný,

Ríding o'er land and sailing o'er séa.

O'h! but we went mérrilý!

We fórded the ríver, and clómb the high hill,
Néver our steeds for a dáy stood still.
Whether we lay in the cáve or the shed,
Our sleép fell sóft on the hardest béd ;
Whether we cóuch'd on our rough capóte,
Or the rougher plánk of our gliding boat;
Or stretch'd on the beach or our saddles spread
As a pillow beneath the résting héad,
Frésh we woke upón the mórrow.

A'll our thoughts and words had scópe,
Wé had health and wé had hope,

Tóil and trável, bút no sórrow.

These are naturally trisyllabic. Where they are symmetrical they are so by accident. A metrical fiction, that conveniently illustrates their structure, is the doctrine that they are lines formed upon measure x a x, for which either x x a or a x x may be substituted, and from which either a x or x a may be formed by ejection of either the first or last unaccented syllable.

§ 238. Convertible Metres.-Such a line as

may

Ere her faithless sons betray'd her

be read in two ways. We may either lay full stress upon the word ere, and read

E're her faithless sóns betray'd her;

or we may lay little or no stress upon either ere or her, reserving the full accentuation for the syllable faith- in faithless, in which case the reading would be

Ere her faithless sóns betray'd her.

Lines of this sort may be called examples of convertible metres, since by changing the accent a dissyllabic line may be converted into one partially trisyllabic, and vice versa.

This property of convertibility is explained by the fact of accentuation being a relative quality. In the example before us ere is sufficiently strongly accented to stand in contrast to her, but it is not sufficiently strongly accented

to stand upon a par with the faith- in faithless if decidedly pronounced.

§ 239. Metrical and grammatical combinations.-The syllables ere her faith- form a metrical, the syllables her faithless sons, a grammatical, combination. When the syllables contained in the same measure are also contained in the same construction, the metrical and the grammatical combinations coincide. Such is the case with the line

Remember the glóries | of Brían | the bráve;

where the same division separates both the measure and the subdivisions of the sense; inasmuch as the word the is connected with the word glories equally in grammar and in metre, in syntax and in prosody. So is of with Brian, and the with brave. The coincidence or non-coincidence between the metrical and grammatical combinations may be called Rhythm.

§ 240. Alliteration of the Anglo-Saxon metres.—In Anglo-Saxon, the metres were, what is called, Alliterative, i. e. a certain number of accented initial syllables, within the space of either a single line or a couplet, began with the same letter: the vowels passing for identical. This system was not only Anglo-Saxon, but Norse as well, and, in a less degree, German also.